893 Sara Blakely: SPANX CEO on Writing Your Billion Dollar Story

The School of Greatness

Lewis Howes

Mindset, Relationships, Entrepreneurship, Mental Health, Education, Greatness, Fitness, Celebrity, Health, Inspiration, Success, Health & Fitness, Self-improvement, Business, Money, Self Care, Celebrity Interview

4.8 • 22K Ratings

🗓️ 25 December 2019

⏱️ 67 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

NOTHING SHOULD STAND IN THE WAY OF YOUR STORY. We've had some pretty amazing women on The School of Greatness. I've learned a lot from each of them. In fact, I learn a lot from all the women around me (almost my whole team is women). Today's guest is no exception. Male, female, old, young - we could all learn from this incredible businessperson. Not only is she the youngest self-made female billionaire in America (wow, right??), she is also the mother of four young kids, the wife of another podcast guest, Jesse Itzler, and the founder and CEO of the massively popular women's apparel brand SPANX. In this episode, I got to sit with and learn from a legend among entrepreneurs: Sara Blakely. During this interview, I kept finding out new things to admire Sara for. She struggled a lot in school (me too!). She sold fax machines door to door FOR 7 YEARS before she had the idea for Spanx. She was rejected by every manufacturing company she took her idea to. But she didn't let any of that stop her. Sara's hustle and can-do attitude is just one thing I learned about her in this interview. We dive into dealing with grief, how to scale companies the right way, what it's like to be mentored by Richard Branson, and much more. Welcome to an inspiring interview with a powerhouse in Episode 893. Some Questions I Ask: How did you meet your husband Jesse? (30:12) How do you stay so grounded and calm with everything you have going on? (32:00) What did you learn from being mentored by Richard Branson? (44:47) What is more challenging for you – running a billion-dollar brand or being a mom? (49:46) In This Episode You Will Learn: What happened in Sara’s life to prepare her for entrepreneurship before she had her big idea (7:12) The list of possible product names Sara considered before she decided on Spanx (11:46) The hardest part of getting her company off the ground (15:55) How Sara guerrilla-marketed her first order of Spanx in Neiman Marcus (20:01) Why being kind to yourself is so important (32:15) How Sara got Warren Buffet to paint his belly for her new book (36:32) What grief and loss can teach us (43:01) Plus much more… If you enjoyed this episode, check out the video, show notes and more at http://www.lewishowes.com/893 and follow at instagram.com/lewishowes

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is episode number eight nine three with Sarah Blakely the inspirational CEO and founder of the billion dollar brand
0:08.4	Spikes
0:10.9	Welcome to the school of greatness. My name is Lewis Howe's former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur and each week
0:19.0	We bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness
0:26.0	Thanks for spending some time with me today now let the class begin
0:31.0	You
0:35.8	George Bernard Shaw said life isn't about finding yourself
0:40.1	Life is about creating yourself and Maya Angelos said there is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you
0:50.8	Have you been creating yourself lately? Have you been
0:55.3	Discovering who you are by taking the actions every day and and failing over and over again to
1:01.8	Create something beautiful that's from within and put it out into the world
1:06.2	Have you been sharing those gifts that only you have with the world?
1:09.9	Or have you been bearing an agony of a story inside of you that you haven't let out yet because you've been too afraid to
1:18.8	Share it with others
1:21.0	This is an opportunity for you
1:23.3	We're at the start of a new year and a new decade coming up and this is your opportunity
1:29.7	To really hear a story from someone who
1:33.7	Overcame some challenges
1:35.7	Didn't hit success right away after school didn't go off and become this massive hit within the first five years
1:43.0	But experienced failure failure failure until she finally reached inside the story that was inside of her and said
1:52.0	I'm gonna share this with the world and this journey led her to an incredible discovery
1:57.7	About who she is and she created something magical for the world and if you don't know who Sarah Blakely is
	...

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